DUSHANBE, July 7, 2016, Asia-Plus -- Former imam-khatib of the Taqvo Mosque in Khujand, the capital of Sughd province, has confessed his membership in the Muslim Brotherhood.

Tajik national TV channel Shabakai Avval (Channel One) on July 4 showed a report on former imam-khatib of the Taqvo Mosque, Orifjon Ergashev, prepared by the Interior Ministry press center.

According to the report, Ergashev voluntarily surrendered himself to police and confessed his membership in the Muslim Brotherhood.

The men said he joined the Muslim Brotherhood during studying abroad from 1993 to 2001.  He was reportedly engaged in propagation of the Muslim Brotherhood ideas among parishioners.  Ergashev said he had been receiving instructions from abroad.

Meanwhile, the case of six mosque imams from the northern province of Sughd, who are accused of membership in the Muslim Brotherhood, moved to a court in late May.  A court in the Bobojonghafourov district is considering the case.

Ms. Fayzinisso Vohidova, a lawyer for imam-khatib Sulaymon Boltuyev, says the mosque imams were detained at various locations around the Sughd province in March and all of them were graduates of the Islamic University of Madinah, in Saudi Arabia.

Besides, five mosque imams from Sughd province were arrested in May for allegedly promoting extremist ideas and recruiting young people to join Islamist militant groups abroad.

Hasan Boboshukurov, the head of the department on religious affairs in Sughd’s Konibodom district, told Radio Liberty’s Tajik Service on May 19 that four of the men led mosque prayers and sermons in village mosques in Konibodom.

A local law enforcement official told RFE/RL on condition of anonymity that the group “had been actively working to recruit young people to take part in wars abroad.”  The official said the five imams'' activities came to the authorities'' attention after a tip from three other imams arrested in the same district in April.

It is worth noting that imam khatibs are appointed in agreement with the government’s committee on religious affairs.  They are obliged to follow refresher courses annually and must routinely re-register.  Also, they are paid salaries from the state budget.

Fifteen Muslim clerics were reportedly arrested on extremism charges in Konibodom and other districts of the northern Sughd province between January and April.

The Society of the Muslim Brothers, shortened to the Muslim Brotherhood, is a transnational Sunni Islamist organization founded in Egypt by Islamic scholar and schoolteacher Hassan al-Banna in 1928. The organization gained supporters throughout the Arab world.   The Brotherhood''s stated goal is to instill the Qur''an and Sunnah as the "sole reference point for ... ordering the life of the Muslim family, individual, community ... and state.”

The Muslim Brotherhood was banned in Tajikistan in 2006 and declared a terrorist group.